Pleased to say I've not had a backlash or been cancelled after declaring my enjoyment of Disney's Snow White last week. In fact, my friends Rose and Pete have both been to see it separately, and declared it a hit, with Rose saying "honestly, really loved it.
Musically, it gave me Greatest Showman vibes". My advice to you would be to ignore the avalanche of criticism on social media, largely being stoked by the phony pharoahs of the culture wars, and just give a watch.
Meanwhile, Jason Statham certainly has a varied LinkedIn profile, and he's gone from being a mechanic to a beekeeper to A Working Man. No doubt he's delighted that the government is clinging onto its claim that 'working people' remain their priority. It's a bone-crunching, silly dialogue chewing, far-fetched, Sly Stallone-produced rollercoaster ride, full of unneccessary sub-plots and Jason Statham doing what he does best...killing everyone in the room. There are shades of John Wick and Taken, as Statham pursues some evil Russians who have kidnapped the daughter of his boss at a construction firm. He will stop at nothing to get her back, using his particular set of skills from his past life as a Marine.
It won't win any awards, but found it a pretty enjoyable watch. There could have been a few more comic one-liners worked into the script, but it does contain the line: "look at those bricks. You ain't a cop, you're a working man". Pulitzer Prize considered stuff. If you enjoyed The Beekeeper, I'm confident you'll also have fun watching this one on the big screen, and whilst it might take itself a little more seriously than it should, it's one of the best action films I've seen in a while.
Meanwhile, The Woman In The Yard turns a promisingly creepy premise into a convoluted, confusing mess. I almost forgot to be scared towards the end, as I was too busy trying to work out what was going on. Following a tragic accident that claimed the life of her husband in a car crash, Ramona (Danielle Deadwyler) is left to raise her two children alone in the farmhouse that they bought together as a 'fix-up' project. Struggling to put food on the table, not to mention keep the lights on, things take a turn for the worse when a mysterious woman shrouded in black appears in the fields outside, and seems to be getting incrementally closer to the property. How did she get there, and what is her intention?
Mercifully, it's only 88 minutes long, but what could have been an original take on grief and battles with poor mental health is destroyed, especially in the way the film ends, which just didn't make a lot of sense to me. It's never a good sign when you find yourself googling plot explainers to try and put the pieces together in some kind of logical order after leaving the cinema. I'd say don't bother, and watch something else instead.
